Hey! I was really into Greek mythology in middle school. And high school. Even got a minor in college. I even have a set of Greek/Roman mythology tattoos!
Oh wait... I am gay. Fuck.
Hey! I was really into Greek mythology in middle school. And high school. Even got a minor in college. I even have a set of Greek/Roman mythology tattoos!
Oh wait... I am gay. Fuck.
Roman history is amazing. Everybody hears of Julius Caesar and maybe Trajan and Hadrian but then pretend that nothing happened after that. Like poof, it was dead, inevitable, Franks and Caliphates are now a thing.
Then when you realise how much Rome had to screw itself over to even get to that point while being struck by famines, massive migratory invasions, the huns while still being in a moderately good shape... That's the good stuff. The story of the fall is a marble being chipped away slowly while telling a beautiful story until there is nothing left of the Western Roman Empire. If Rome had a favorite hobby it would be waging war on itself.
Eastern Roman Empire was alive and kicking until the 1450's and if you think there's not much there then look up Justinian's restoration. They even had horseback archers like the mongols and huns for a while that had to train for many years. Hell, even look at a map that goes back some years pre-caliphate period.
Even as recently as 1912 there were people in the Aegean islands that identified as Roman. I wish there would be a series that would cover the history of Rome properly and not just "CaEsAr KiLlEd gAuLs aNd sExEd cLeOpAtRa" for the billionth time.
It's really a shame that even figures such as the Gracchi brothers (or really any of the pre-Caesar Populares figures) are hardly ever brought up as well, although I guess I can't be too surprised that radical social reformers are being left out.
I've always thought the mid-late Roman Republic was more interesting than the imperial era, and the Gracchi are easily the most fascinating chapter. Noble aristocrats becoming populist ideologues, the increasingly bitter struggle over creaky governmental norms (like their weaponization of the tribunal veto to shut down the city), the introduction of political violence. Very instructive for our current era, imho.
I want an HBO miniseries on Scipio Africanus vs Hannibal.
Then I want another HBO mini-series on the Flavian dynasty. The eruption of Vesuvius, the first (?) Jewish rebellion, and the questionable conquest of Brittania all happened under Titus. I would love to see a dramatic reenactment of the Romans absolutely losing their minds at how fucking cursed their empire suddenly was.
Like poof, it was dead
I wish, so much of history (and especially people talking about history) is just recounting Greco-Roman history or trying to embody it. Even American nationalism feels like Roman nationalism v4.3.
I'm rather sick of everyone and everything trying to connect themselves to something roman or greek, then stopping dead. Everyone and their dog has a latin motto, multiple fields are all but written in latin, and that pantheon is the first and often only stop for mythology names; you'd think Caligula was still out there banging his worries away.
Anyway, y'all should look up my boy Gilgamesh.
I wish there would be a series that would cover the history of Rome properly
you mean like Mike Duncan's The History of Rome?
Idk how im going to tell my wife im gay
I don't know how to tell my wife I'm a swan.
"I like Viking stuff"
Might be just into Norse mythology. Might be into Nazis.
I loved all the Viking / Norse shit when I was younger. Comics, games, etc, I couldn't get enough.
But then I started talking to people who followed that aesthetic and was disappointed by exactly 100% of them.
Still love the games. Lost Vikings, Rune, GoW, etc
I like this band named Heilung, which has some Viking-ish costumes and lore etc. (although more like Conan's Hyperborea). They have to put a disclaimer at the start of their videos which is basically a politer version of "Nazi punks fuck off".
disclaimer at the start of their videos which is basically a politer version of “Nazi punks fuck off”.
The whole scene has been doing that since what 70 years or so now. After the war some groups of people started seriously wondering about what civilisation is, how it's very much not rooted in whether or not you wear a suit or not, and started looking for roots. The old Germanic roots were at that time actually out of the question: The Nazis had appropriated and bent them to their brand of insanity, but Karl May existed and with the US there were actual Indians in Germany in the form of GIs. Cultural exchange happened, pretty much unnoticed by the general population, and with that came knowledge: Tradition is not the praying to the ashes, but the passing of the fire, that exchange helped people find genuine embers, small as they were. Once people started to flame the symbols of those embers Nazis came along and wanted to be part of it and promptly were told to fuck off -- not just out of a general antifascist stance but also because Nazis, in particular, were the ones who poisoned the little that was left after Christianisation. Then time moved on and a lot happened. Baudrillard, for one. Bear with me:
You might've noticed that Heilung doesn't have Germanic symbology front and left and centre -- it's not about the, or any, symbology. They're not Asatru or something, their costumes and historical references go back further than the Norse (pretty much as far as they can). About the closest you get is song titles written in runic alphabet and some consistent choices in graphic design looking quite like Nordic carvings -- but none of that is religious stuff as-such.
From what I can tell Nazis don't actually try to get a piece of that particular pie: It's not to their liking. They like their symbols, their flags to rally around, their fetishes, to distract themselves from realising what they're actually doing. The "Nazi punks fuck off" part is there for people stumbling across it, vibing with it, and wondering whether it's kosher. Yes, yes it very much is. They're plain and simply modern shamans who happen to be history nerds, and western esotericism has been post-structural for long enough now that the lack of symbolic system shouldn't really surprise, c.f. e.g. Chaos Magick. They write and perform rituals to speak to parts of the psyche that what we call civilisation may have forgotten, but certainly not the genome. That, you know, one great being that was always there.
"I'm really into WW2 artifact collecting!"
Only collects things associated with Wehrmacht / SS
Yeaaaah, buddy, collector you are!
What's crazy is I have a Jewish coworker just like this.. and I'm not sure what to make of it. But he voted for trump, so now I'm like... "Ehhhh. I don't think I like this guy".
I used to date a girl that had basically grown up in the antique shop that her father owned. It was amazing - we would watch Antiques Roadshow and she knew what everything was and almost exactly what the experts would say it was worth every time. After her father died she ended up with a ton of stuff in her house, and one day I went over there to find she had put up an "Ein Volk, Ein Reich, Ein Führer!" poster from the 1930s featuring good ol' Adolf above the fireplace. She wasn't pro-Hitler or anything, just thought it was an interesting bit of history. I was like "babe, c'mon, we want to keep our friends".
"The sengoku period is so interesting": this person is a massive weeb. I would know.
How many animes have you seen with Oda Nobunaga in them?
Actually him and not a cute or buff girl with his name? None.
OK hear me out, what if the reason I like WW2 history is because there's a lot of kicking nazi ass
Or to write lore accurate day in the life of a 40k human soldier
WW1 enthusiasts waiting desperately to be referenced just one time ever:
As a history student I was really afraid that I would meet a ton of right wingers. But I must say the worst kind of people so far are history students that only study history to become teachers. They keep laughing at me saying that at least they have a future and that I will eventually switch sides and become a teacher too, I just don't know it yet :(
You may have met a ton of right wingers. In hindsight, most of my high school history and civics teachers had a right wing slant to their anecdotes.
I've noticed that, after a relative lull, people are getting bullied for traditional reasons again. However the bullies code those reasons as deplorable, so that they can imply their targets are just assholes.
What about history pf philosophy? Im on episode 326 of the history of philosophy without any gaps podcast and I really enjoying it. We're just finishing Byzantine philosophy and getting ready for the Renaissance.
That someone needs to set aside six hours, some strong alcohol, and a barrel to live in before engaging.
I’m a simple plucked chicken, I got no time for that philosophizing.
Sounds like you’re ready for a lecture on the Philosophy of Cynicism as practiced by Antisthenes and his student Diogenes. The latter of whom famously lived in a clay pot…
Depends on your opinions re Ayn Rand.
I'm interested in the subjects that I never learned in school, like Asian history or ancient Mesopotamian history. African empires seems interesting too, and I'm very curious about how the Polynesians came to be, seems wild.
i was into greek mythological as a kid cuz of percy jackson but it just made me extremely horny
What about "Here's an excerpt from a paper I wrote on how the Erfurt Latrine Disaster indirectly lead to the George W. Bush shoeing incident" ?
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